Caribbean news briefs

HAITI: Judge drops kidnapping case against US missionaries; only 1 still in jail faces lesser charge

PORT-AU-PRINCE, Haiti (AP) - A Haitian judge said Monday he has dismissed kidnapping and criminal association charges against 10 American missionaries detained for trying to take a busload of children out of the country after the Jan. 12 earthquake.

Judge Bernard Saint-Vil said Laura Silsby, the last of the 10 missionaries jailed in Haiti, still faced a lesser charge for allegedly organizing the effort to transport the 33 children to an orphanage they were setting up in the Dominican Republic.

Silsby faces up to three years in prison if convicted on the remaining charge, the "organization of irregular trips," from a 1980 statute restricting travel out of Haiti signed by then-dictator Jean-Claude Duvalier.

Silsby declined comment from her jail cell. Shiller Roi, a lawyer for Silsby, declined comment, saying he hadn't yet received the judge's written decision.

The judge told The Associated Press that the charge of organizing the trip was also pending against Jean Sainvil, a Haitian-born pastor from Atlanta who also helped organize the venture. Sainvil did not immediately respond to message left on his voicemail.

The judge, who spoke to AP in a brief phone interview, did not explain the reasons for his decisions.

It was the latest development in a case that emerged amid the chaos following the devastating earthquake, which the government said killed an estimated 230,000 people and left hundreds of thousands of people homeless.

Border guards detained the Americans on Jan. 29 as they tried to enter the Dominican Republic from Haiti without the required documents for the children.

HAVANA (AP) - Nearly every eligible Cuban cast ballots in a vote the communist government proclaims is proof of the island's democracy. But if headlines were made, it was by six elderly women standing under an ancient ficus tree, enduring seven hours of insults and obscenities for demanding political prisoners be freed.

Cuba complains the foreign media makes way too much of a small, divided dissident movement that has little sway with ordinary people. But the government has helped draw attention to the women - known as the Damas de Blanco, or Ladies in White - by choosing, with no explanation, to start blocking their small weekly protests after seven years of tolerating them.

Wayne Smith, a former top American diplomat in Havana, said the unwanted attention began when the government decided to take a hard line.

"The Damas have been marching for a long time and it hasn't raised any problems" for the government, said Smith, a senior fellow at the Washington-based Center for International Policy who has long argued that the U.S. should lift its 48-year trade embargo on Cuba. "Suddenly, when the Cubans say, 'You can't march,' then there's a story. Then the press comes out."

Indeed, after years of obscurity, the women have become a cause celebre among Cuban-American exiles in the United States. The move to quash their protests has many in Washington wondering if Havana is trying to scuttle relations that seemed on the mend just months ago.

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ANTIGUA: Judge paves way for extradition of ex-regulator indicted in alleged Stanford fraud

ST. JOHN'S, Antigua (AP) - An Antiguan judge on Monday paved the way for extradition to the United States of a former financial regulator indicted in an alleged $7 billion swindle by jailed Texas financier R. Allen Stanford.

Lawyers for the Caribbean nation's former top regulator, Leroy King, are expected to quickly file a written challenge - called a writ of habeas corpus - to the committal ruling by Chief Magistrate Ivan Walters.

As a result, the extradition process for King is expected to be tied up for several more months. It had been postponed last year after defense lawyers requested more time to prepare.

King, who remains under house arrest, declined to speak to reporters.

He was fired as Antigua's top financial regulator after being accused of accepting bribes to turn a blind eye to irregularities in Stanford's financial empire. He also allegedly wrote false and misleading letters to the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission.

U.S. prosecutors allege Stanford and other executives of the now defunct Houston-based Stanford Financial Group orchestrated a massive Ponzi scheme by advising clients to invest more than $7 billion in certificates of deposit from the Stanford International Bank in Antigua.

In a court filing last year, James M. Davis, Stanford's former finance chief, alleged his ex-boss secured King's loyalty in a "blood oath" brotherhood ceremony. Davis made the comments as part of a plea deal he made with the U.S. Justice Department.

King had led Antigua's Financial Services Regulatory Commission.

Stanford and three executives have pleaded not guilty to various charges, including money laundering and wire and mail fraud, in a 21-count indictment. Stanford has been jailed since being indicted last June while the three executives are free on bond.

SAN JUAN, Puerto Rico (AP) - A lawyer pleaded guilty Monday to aiding one of the Caribbean's most wanted drug suspects - a convicted killer who allegedly built a criminal empire in the Dominican Republic after escaping from prison in his native Puerto Rico.

Yesenia Vazquez Torres, who was a law firm receptionist at the time of the crime, acknowledged letting Jose Figueroa Agosto use her address to apply for a passport under a fake name. She was sentenced to community service and a year of probation in line with a plea agreement.

Figueroa's flight from the U.S. territory has come under scrutiny since he emerged as the most wanted fugitive in the neighboring Dominican Republic.

Also known as "Junior Capsula," he escaped prison in November 1999 by presenting guards with a forged release order. He is now the target of a search by U.S. and Dominican authorities, for the alleged trafficking of Colombian drugs to the U.S. mainland through Puerto Rico.

Puerto Rico's justice department has also been investigating possible ties between Figueroa and an island lawmaker - one of several politicians who lobbied unsuccessfully for his pardon in the 1990s.

Vazquez, 31, told a judge Monday that Figueroa was a client of the law firm where she answered phones, and that he asked to use her address for the application the month after his escape.

When the passport arrived, Vazquez said, she noticed the document was addressed to a different name - Figueroa's alias - but he told her he would take care of it.

PORT-OF-SPAIN, Trinidad (AP) - Trinidad has lifted an entry ban for a U.S. political campaign strategist as the twin-island Caribbean nation prepares for general elections.

Trinidad's national security minister says Henry Bernard Campbell can enter the country and continue his work for the opposition. The American was previously denied entry based on the island's immigration laws.

Campbell is advising the United National Congress Party on its campaign strategy for the May 24 elections. Party leaders hade blasted the government for denying entry to Campbell.

The announcement of government's shift came Monday from National Security Minister Martin Joseph.